The Tale of the Seasons
by Erin7
Summary: *Completed* Humorous parody of the story of Persephone's abduction, based on a ballet production of the same story I played Hermes in... becoming more irreverant and funny. Please read & review, and I'll review something of yours in return!
1. Abduction

Beneath the light and warmth of the earth, Hades sulked.  
  
"Hungry, m'lord?" ventured one of his minions, tentatively shoving a generously decked tray at the god's nose.  
  
Hades pushed the tray away without a glance. The goblet of nectar spilled on the red-unitard-clad servant who scurried away, mouse-like.  
  
The King of the Underworld returned to the important task of honing his brooding skills, contemplating a red-velvet pillow graced by a tiara that glittered silver in the dull light.  
  
Lonely Hades lifted the gem-studded crown and caressed it gently with one hand, before sighing mournfully and placing it - none too gently - upon the empty throne found on his left.  
  
Hades stood, and called for his goons. "Attend me! The Underworld has want of a Queen."  
  
  
  
  
  
"You're ripping out my beautiful tresses, mother," complained a pretty, coddled looking girl. "And why do you get to wear a tiara? It's not fair."  
  
Demeter pinned a flowered headpiece into her daughter's golden-brown hair, looking only faintly irked. "Because I'm a goddess. Now run along and pick flowers like a good girl."  
  
"But mother, I'm a goddess too! Why do I get to wear..." Persephone trailed off, distracted by a hand-held mirror. She admired her reflection for a moment. "Are you sure the flowers will stay in?"  
  
"Yes, dear," Demeter said with remarkable patience, handing the girl a basket. "The flowers," she reminded her daughter, quickly embracing her before departing.  
  
Persephone reluctantly set aside the mirror and skipped off to the fields to gather wild flowers.  
  
  
  
  
  
"Does this wig make me look effeminate, Hermes?" Zeus looked anxiously to his messenger, smoothing back the blond curls with an expectant expression.  
  
Hermes sighed inwardly and tried to formulate a proper response. "Err, just a bit. Perhaps the other one?" He managed not to wince at tan tights Zeus had tucked his tunic into. "Yes, that's better. Now hold the lightning bolt up, that gives you a manly look."  
  
Zeus looked grateful. "Ah, good thinking, Hermes. What would I do without you..? Run along now, you're dismissed."  
  
Hermes bowed low and fled before his father could change his mind.  
  
  
  
Aphrodite and Eros watched from behind a tree as Hades and his company emerged from the Underworld.  
  
The goddess of love shook her pretty head with disapproval "Poor Hades. No one deserves to be without love," she informed her son. "I'm confident that it can resolve any problem." Aphrodite conveniently forgot the Trojan War.  
  
Eros pulled on his mother's skirts, and pointed to a pretty girl kneeling in the grass beside a basket of flowers.  
  
Aphrodite's plump red lips curved upwards in a somewhat malicious smile. "Persephone," she purred, smugly. She had been looking for a way to be revenged on Demeter for making insinuations about her... purity. Nevermind that they were true. "I do believe I'd found Hades his bride."  
  
Eros grinned impishly and notched an arrow to his bow.  
  
  
  
Persephone tucked flowers into her hair and dress, pirouetting gaily about the meadow. She was humming to herself absently when she spotted a beautiful flower close by. It was a deep crimson rose, petals delicate and without a single imperfection.  
  
Persephone bent down and inhaled the sweet aroma that was a rarity in such exquisitely perfect roses. She moved to pick it, as if in a trance, and found to her dismay that it wasn't actually growing in the ground... and screamed. Loudly.  
  
A few minutes later, the clearing was still and empty, and the red flower lay crushed in the grass beside the basket full of flowers. 


	2. Demeter Kills Things

Persephone pushed away the wineglass and turned her head away from Hades haughtily.  
  
Once the initial fear had passed, Persephone realized the god did not intend her any harm. Where she had been submissive and meek, she turned icy and aloof. Hades' entreaties for the girl to feast with him might have been directed at a stalactite for all they affected Persephone.  
  
Demeter's daughter was seated on a grand throne, attended by servants. A black velvet cloak was drawn about her shoulders and a crown graced her brow. Well... there's the tiara you wanted, goddess.  
  
  
  
Back on the surface, Demeter was searching for her daughter. She wandered the fields, perplexed and beginning to lose patience.  
  
From the nearby village of Elyousis, a pack of children skipped in, playing and chattering amongst themselves.  
  
Demeter grabbed a young girl by the arm and asked her if she knew of her daughter's whereabouts. "Please... you must have seen her." The child had not seen here, and neither had the next, and the next, and the next she asked.  
  
An odd desperation came into the goddess' eyes, becoming stronger with each passing moment. The villagers began to look nervous and began to back away, cautiously.  
  
That was the moment when Demeter found the basket and the crushed blossom with a gasp of both shock and alarm. After a moment, her expression grew oddly calm. She picked up the flower carefully and smelled it. Numbly, she cradled it in her palms, and rocked the flower like it was her child... back and forth, back and forth...  
  
The children exchanged nervous glances.  
  
Demeter seemed to have lost any awareness of their presence. She lifted the flower to the light, suddenly, and plucked a petal from it. And then she dropped it.  
  
The petal floated slowly to the ground, feather-like. It lay there, half- wilted and forlorn. Demeter was transfixed. Another petal fell, soon joined by another, and another, and another...  
  
Demeter stared at the dead stem for a moment. And then she dropped it, horrified, the back of one hand pulled to her brow with dismay. "Persephone," she whispered, because she could remember no other words.  
  
She grew angry. Bitterly, violently angry. The fire in her belly grew, fed and strengthened by the transformation of her sorrow to rage.  
  
Demeter unfastened her soil-brown cloak and began to kill the all the flowers.  
  
"While I mourn my daughter, the entire earth shall mourn with me!"  
  
The goddess of the harvest gazed up at Mount Olympus, shaking one fist and calling curses up to Zeus.  
  
  
  
Hermes muttered profanity as he held an ice pack to one rather swollen looking ankle and watched it turn to pretty shades of purple (is that plum or heliotrope?)  
  
The messenger god managed to bind the ice pack to the wisteria (or eggplant!) bruised foot. He reached for his sandals and began to bend the wings back into shape, grumbling. "Stupid bad ankles... stupid bad landings... stupid bent wings..."  
  
The sound of horns nearly split Hermes' ears. Zeus was calling. Hermes tossed aside the ice pack and donned his sandals and hat.  
  
"...stupid Zeus." 


	3. Errands

"Why me?" Hermes sulkily asked his father. "Is it your legs?" Daringly insolent, perhaps, especially when Hermes knew perfectly well that it /was/ his job to run errands... but that didn't mean he couldn't fight every step, (or flap) of the way..  
  
"Because I told you to," Zeus announced sternly. "Now scoot, and find that girl before everyone on Earth starves and stops worshipping me."  
  
Hermes pouted as he made his down from Mount Olympus, grumbling about ankle pain and stupid errands. "Just because /he/ has those shiny lightning bolts doesn't mean /I/ should have to do his damn dirty work... "  
  
The god summoned the sun, and sat, polishing his hat and caduceus while he waited for the celestial being to grace him with his illustrious, luminous (pardon the pun) presence.  
  
"My feet are killing me," offered the sun, Helios, by way of greeting when he arrived, clad in a sparkly gold dress. "And what's with the American Medical Association symbol-stick-thingy?"  
  
Hermes glared. "WHAT IS the American Medical Assocation? THIS is my caduceus. See, two snakes, not one..." how many people are going to ask that before I give up and hang a damn sign around my neck?"  
  
The sun shrugged, "Whatever. Did you want something? You did, after all, call me here..."  
  
"Demeter's brat is missing... Zeus commands the winds to search the earth for her."  
  
"Demeter's brat? Isn't Persephone your sister?" inquired Helios, brows arched quizzically.  
  
"Half sister," amended Hermes. "But then again, Athena, Dionysis, Ares, Apollo, Artemis, and a slew of mortals are all my half-siblings as well... doesn't mean I owe them any special loyalty. We're /all/ related by some way or another because Zeus can't seem to keep his unit in his pants, err, robes. It's lucky we're gods, or we'd be so damn inbred we couldn't stand up." Hermes eyed the ankle braces on both his feet.  
  
Helios wasn't listening. "My head piece is heavy. And ugly." With that, he bid Hermes farewell. "Time to borrow the Winds from Aeolus, neh? Wouldn't want Lightning-Bolt-Wig-Man to get irked."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"You want to me to do what?" Hermes scowled at Helios.  
  
"Go tell Zeus. I did /my/ part. Persephone's nowhere to be found on Earth, and someone's got to tell Zeus. You're his messenger."  
  
"Right. His messenger, not yours," pointed out Hermes. "Besides, if she's not on Earth, she must be in the Underworld. You cannot /begin/ to comprehend just how little I want to be caught up more in this unfolding Demeter/Zeus/Hades conflict..."  
  
Helios grinned a bit. "Not my problem, now is it?  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Hermes was lost in the woods. Dead woods, specifically: Demeter had been quite thorough in her destruction. He was looking for that same goddess, in fact.  
  
Zeus hadn't lost any time informing Hermes he was to tell Demeter of Persephone's whereabouts.  
  
Hermes hadn't lost any time sulking. There are few things worse than being the bitch of the gods, he reflected.  
  
That was when he remembered he could un-lose himself, so to speak by simply flying out of the forest. Distracted from the task of being sullen, he decided to focus completely on the task of finding Demeter and telling her what had become of her daughter.  
  
He finally found Demeter in a clearing, picking dead flowers and methodically shredding them to tiny... flower-bits.  
  
She had the look of a mad-woman, eyes bloodshot and half-crazed.  
  
"Your daughter..." Hermes began, trying not to stare in morbid fascinating. "Hades took her to the Underworld - to make her his Queen."  
  
Demeter narrowed her eyes. "You tell that bastard that if he doesn't make Hades return my daughter - /our/ daughter - to me... I will make certain that everyone on Earth dies."  
  
Hermes cleared his throat. "Err, may I assume you mean 'that bastard' to mean Zeus?" He wondered if Demeter would mince him like the dead blossoms if he refused. "Err, certainly. My pleasure."  
  
Hermes fled. 


	4. Hades

The river Styx stood before Hermes, wide and dark. It twisted as it flowed, coiling like some terrible black viper.  
  
The stench of death accosted Hermes' nostrils, thick and poisonous. The god stepped aboard the river's barge, nodding wordlessly to Charon.  
  
The ferryman acknowledged Hermes' presence with a chilling disinterest, comprehending that the god must be on Zeus' business and therefore should not be interfered with, for fear of being made the adulterous god's next wife... or perhaps conquest would be more appropriate. One can never be sure of a man that tucks his tunic into his tights.  
  
When the ferry had reached the opposing bank, Hermes made his way off the boat and to the gates of Hades, accidentally bumping into one of the axe-burdened guard as he burst through. "Sorry 'bout that."  
  
The throne room was grand and adorned in a myriad of precious gems that glittered elusively in the torch light. Hades was seated in a polished, velvet cushioned throne, elegant in its simplicity. It looked out of place surrounded by the ornate and rather gaudy gold and silver of the hall's decor. Beside him sat Demeter's daughter; a pretty thing, but fragile looking in a realm of cold stone and marble.  
  
Hades leaped quickly to his feet as the messenger god burst forth, instantly suspicious. "Hermes," he sneered, tugging down his tunic in an attempt to hide his breasts, "What does my illustrious brother command?"  
  
Hermes swallowed a sigh. Stupid gods. Why can't Zeus do his own dirty work? "The girl. You must release her."  
  
Hades looked indignant, "Persephone will not leave. She is my Queen, my love!"  
  
Voice dry, brows arched, Hermes replied. "It's really quite tragic, but I have my orders and those are to bring the girl back to her mother." ... who is scary and quite mad...  
  
Hermes stepped forward and took Persephone by one cold, clammy hand, pulling her toward him. She came readily, eagerly. "Besides, since when does stealing and deflowering a little girl make her your love? She seems to bit anxious to come with me, hmm?"  
  
Rage contorted Hades' face in a manner that was really quite intimidating, making Hermes wonder whether or not he'd prefer being locked up alone in a room with him, or Demeter. It was a hard choice. And all he wanted was to be left in peace to polish his wings and heal his ankles. Oh, and the shin splints that seemed to be developing in that left leg....  
  
That was about the time Hermes noticed that the dark lord's henchmen had grabbed him by both arms and weren't exactly keen on letting him go. Stupid wandering mind... must pay attention to the action in the future. Persephone was restrained similarly by a second pair of minions.  
  
Hermes struggled without avail, then jabbed at one of his captors' groin with his caduceus. The other stayed his blow. Bloody hell. This was not in the job description. "You're a fool, Hades. Zeus won't stand for this."  
  
Persephone pawed at one of the servants hovering over her. "Eww, don't touch me." The servant in question shrunk back from the look Hades gave her, and went off to play with Persephone's tiara. Realizing it was on Persephone's head, she played with the cushion for a bit and then went off to solicit the horrified male henchmen. And then the writer returned to the main point of the story.  
  
Hades paced back and forth, muttering to himself. He was stuck between a rock and a hard place, and he knew it. Keep the girl, incur Zeus' wrath... lose the girl, live in desolation for... well, eternity. Immortality can be a bitch.  
  
Suddenly, he was struck by an idea. The kind of light-bulb over the head kind of thing, just lacking in the light-bulb area. Low budget type deal, you know. He clapped his hands and gave a brisk order to a subordinate. She left, quickly returning with a large ball, suspiciously the size of a hamster ball. It glowed plaster-red.  
  
Persephone tilted her head, distracted from her plight. "Is it a hat?"  
  
Hades lifted the... thing.. and admired it the way an evil mastermind admires his weapon of mass destruction. "You must leave, of course, my love. But you must be hungry. First, you must eat from this luscious pomegranate."  
  
Hermes eyed the... thing. "Right. Pomegranate. Sure. Have a taste and let's go." Someone never did his homework on the food of the dead stuff. Or maybe he just didn't care.  
  
Persephone gazed at the... thing, and then looked excitedly to Hades. "You mean if I eat some, I can go? Home? I'll do it."  
  
Hades would have rubbed his hands together gleefully, had his hands been free. He plucked a seed from the fruit and gave it to Persephone, who ate it eagerly while Mahler's 1st boomed enthusiastically in the background. Hades continued to feed her, but after the sixth seed, Persephone shook her head. "I'm full... and it tastes kinda like hamster."  
  
Hades shrugged, and shoved the pomegranate back into the arms of the servant, who scurried off meekly. "You are free to go."  
  
Hermes shook himself free of his captors, taking the opportunity to poke the one that looked like his father in the kneecap. Take that! Then he grabbed Persephone, and fled. Woot! 


	5. Conflict

Hermes looked down at earth from atop Mount Olympus, watching the goddess of the harvest and her newly recovered daughter as they revived the barren ground. Flowers sprouted and bloomed at an impressive rate. Hermes wondered if Demeter would grow him a protective wall of thorns. Zeus-proof ones, specifically.  
  
Sunlight beamed down upon the pair, warming the meadows with its gentle rays. Some of Persephone's friends skipped in, the rest following soon after. They had to jump over some of the flowers, who had rooted themselves to the ground in the wrong places, happy oblivious to their pathway obstruction. Frolicking ensued.  
  
Hermes wondered if Zeus would mind if he retched on his sandals. It probably wasn't worth a try.  
  
The messenger brightened considerably as Hades emerged from the Underworld and wrested Persephone away from Demeter by one delicate arm. This is better than TV!  
  
Demeter grabbed her daughter back and spat at Hades, "Freak."  
  
Persephone squealed and pulled away from them both. "You're MESSING UP MY HAIR!"  
  
Hermes sniggered a little, happy to be watching from a distance with his feet... his ankles, up. He glanced at Zeus, wondering how long it'd take before the arch-god would intervene. Not before he'd finished re-coifing his blond wig, Hermes surmised. After all, who'd take the decrees of a balding god seriously?  
  
Demeter and Hades stared at Persephone for a moment. Then, looking a bit anxious, Demeter pulled Hades aside.  
  
"Hey... we don't look like lesbian lovers, do we?"  
  
Hades looked confuzzled. "Er. Not that I noticed."  
  
Demeter breathed a sigh of relief. "Good," she beamed. "Freak."  
  
They both went back to yanking Persephone back and forth, who smoothed her hair down worriedly whenever she had a hand free.  
  
Hermes hopped up and started heading over to the sacred fires of Mount Olympus. "Popcorn, Zeus?" he inquired politely of his father. Then he noticed Zeus wasn't there. "Aww, damn," Hermes pouted, looking down to the Earth. "You do know your wig is on sideways, right?" 


	6. Resolution

Lightning flickered across the canvas of the sky, accompanied by a clap of thunder. It looked oddly out of place in the bright sunlight of the morn.  
  
Zeus brandished the lightning and removed Demeter's teeth from Hades' shoulder rather roughly. "Enough!" He adjusted his toupee. "Now... what seems to be the problem?"  
  
Demeter shot Hades a dirty look and placed one hand possessively on her daughter's shoulder. Perhaps 'gripped' would be a more apt description. "/Your/ freak of a brother is trying to regain /your/ daughter," she began snappishly, shifting the black look to Zeus. "What exactly to you plan to do about it?" Freak.  
  
Zeus shifted uneasily. "He's /your/ brother too," the god pointed out. He looked nervous, Hermes noticed from Olympus. Maybe he was scared of Demeter too. Being on the mountain sure beat being down with the threesome.  
  
For a moment, Demeter appeared as though she'd like to grab Zeus' lightning bolt and skewer him with it. Directly after she'd impaled Hades, that is. With commendable patience, the goddess did neither. "Whatever. Your brother, my brother, either way, you tell him to get his slimy-dead hands off my daughter, or I kill everyone on Earth."  
  
Zeus cleared his throat nervously. "Err, yes'm." Wouldn't be much of a god without any worshippers. He attempted to summon a commanding voice and turned to address his brother. "Hades. You will leave Persephone and her mother in peace. Are we clear? Grea-"  
  
Hades finally broke in, voice unusually smug. "I think not, oh great sib, for there is something you don't know. Persephone partook of several pomegranate seeds! She is legitimately mine."  
  
Demeter snorted. "Oh yeah, try the old ate-the-food-of-the-dead story. Come on; give us one we haven't heard before! It's right off the Lame-O Meter."  
  
Persephone cleared her throat timidly. "Um... Mom?"  
  
Turning her attention to Persephone, Demeter announced eloquently, "Crap," and looked semi-hopeful, "You didn't /really/, did you?"  
  
"Well, um, kinda.. just a little." Persephone looked away, sheepishly. "I only had six seeds."  
  
"Quit looking so damn pleased with yourself, Hades," Demeter growled at Hades. "I don't give a damn what she ate, she's still mine and she'll be with me or everyone will die."  
  
Hades pondered that a moment. "Ooo. That means more guests for me!"  
  
"You bast-" Demeter was cut off by the flash of lightning.  
  
"ENOUGH!" Zeus roared, sounding bizarrely authoritative, for once. "I will tell you both how this is going to work, and you will both say yes sir and shut up. Got it?" He did not wait for a response. "Six seeds. Persephone will spend a month in the Underworld for each seed eaten. The other months, she will be with Demeter."  
  
No, piglet, that would not be a good plan. Neither Demeter nor Hades particularly liked this idea, and broke in angrily with their dissension immediately. They were interrupted by another flash of lighting that destroyed a nearby tree.  
  
"Err, that plan sounds great," Hades quickly amended, bowing his head respectfully to Zeus in a "you're the alpha-dog" way.  
  
For Demeter, the decision took a moment longer. Disdaining to bow her head or drop a curtsey, the goddess' expression transformed from enraged to icy. "Very well. But the Earth will be barren during those months."  
  
Knowing better than to argue with her, Zeus simply nodded. "It's settled. She will stay on Earth for the first half year. Hermes will be here to escort her to Hades in six months time."  
  
Hermes sighed. "Bloody hell." 


	7. Closure

It was a cheerful Spring afternoon, mild in both temperature and in events. Hermes was seated on a rock underneath the partial shade of a tree, reading a book called "Medical Self Care Resource: Ankle Injuries". He frowned and set it aside briefly to slather some white goop on his face, shoulders, and arms.  
  
"Stupid Helios... couldn't you try being a little less ultra-violety on my poor sensitive skin? My back is still pink from that trip to the beach... The thought of Zeus putting the sunblock on my back may have been repulsive, but so is the thought of skin canc-"  
  
Hermes was interrupted by bubbly looking individual dressed in green with.. flower type attachments or something... as they bumped into his rock. And his foot.  
  
"Oww," Hermes said blandly, more from habit then actual pain. White lotion dribbled onto one winged-sandal. "Smoothly done," he offered sardonically, eyeing the newcomer.  
  
"I didn't do it!" denied the Zephyr, West Wind. "It just.. happened. And anyway, I'm in a hurry, so it's not my fault. See, I'm like, the bringer of Spring. So I just like, brought it."  
  
Hermes pondered this a moment, and then looked around. "Gee. It looks like Spring is already here."  
  
Zephyr rolled her-um, his eyes at the stupid god. "Go suck an elf. You're rather thick-skulled... one of Zeus' brood, then?" Hermes winced. Zephyr continued. "I already brought Spring, I just wanted to make sure it had worked out okay. You know, the whole growing-stuff deal. So, have you seen Harry Potter?"  
  
Hermes blinked. "Err, I didn't know a hairy potter lived around here."  
  
"Oh.. oh well!" Zephyr declared bubbly, taking a seat on an adjacent rock. "I think I'll wait here with you a while. Say, do you have a mirror I could borrow?"  
  
After what seemed, quite literally, like an eternity, the South Wind arrived, and the West Wind wandered off to - as Hermes understood - suck on elves.  
  
  
  
Notus sauntered in, slouching with a sort of indifferent nonchalance. He was chewing gum, his jaw moving almost mechanically up and down. The air grew noticeably warmer. More humid, too.  
  
Hermes swatted a mosquito and fanned himself, regarding the arriving wind with reservations. Summer. Blech. Hey, when do you think Winter will be along?"  
  
Notus offered a shrug in reply. Except it couldn't be really called a shrug. More of a half shrug. Or a one third shrug. "Dunno. After Autumn?"  
  
Hermes pondered this. "Gee, that's helpful, Notus... Hey. Your dress is too small. And too.. like, neon orange."  
  
The wind changed his stance, settling comfortably into one hip. "It's not a dress. And I usually go by Angel... Or sometimes Aladdin."  
  
Hermes digested this. "Right. Oh look, it's time for me to go get Persephone, now. Bye No-um, Al..."  
  
  
  
  
  
Hermes did the usual fleeing thing, and ran right into Eurus. "Ouch.. you know, that foot-in-head thing is really not as much fun as it looks," he informed the East Wind testily. "You guys are all over.. I just left Alad-I mean I just left Notus."  
  
Eurus' eyes widened. "Notus? You didn't by any chance ask him if he had been to the South Pole recently, huh?"  
  
Hermes blinked, eyeing Eurus. "Can't say I did. Why do you care about the South..." he trailed off, noticing the stuffed penguin tucked underneath the wind's arm. "Right. Gotcha."  
  
Eurus lifted the penguin onto his head enthusiastically and thrust one wing at bewildered Hermes. "Say hi to Pete! Do you like penguins?"  
  
Hermes clasped the han-the wing-dubiously. "They're all right... I rather prefer ducks, though. With green heads. The shiny kind, yah know."  
  
"Ducks?" scoffed Eurus, cackling slightly. And then he began dancing about in a way that was oddly creepy, proclaiming, "Goody-goody-two-shoes, goody-goody-two-shoes..."  
  
Hermes inched away from the wind. "I'm going to go fetch Persephone now." A reason to escape! Who would have ever thought this job had perks? Leaves were beginning to turn gold and crimson as Hermes pivoted and took off.  
  
"Ook!" the wind called to the messenger's retreating back.  
  
  
  
Persephone wriggled out of Hermes grasp and flounced in front of him on the way to the Underworld, chattering away happily. "And then see, I'll get to wear my tiara again! Well, at least until Spring..."  
  
Hermes raised one brow. Once the whole debacle had been settled, Persephone had seemed quite contented with her role. Of course, being Queen of the Underworld wasn't exactly the worst fate in the world. No, that would be Hermes' fate. In one certain opinion, at least.  
  
When they reached the gates, Hermes was happy to get rid of the babbling child. He bid her farewell and wandered off to wait for Winter to arrive, so he could return to his task of playing chauffeur for Persephone. Goody.  
  
Hermes had drifted off to sleep when a stray snowflake landed on his nose and roused him from his nap. (A messenger must be a light sleeper) He opened one eye and came face to face with Boreas.  
  
"Eeesh!" Hermes proclaimed eloquently. "Don't do that, it's creepy."  
  
'Sorry," apologized the North Wind. "But have you seen my palmetto bug? I've lost it."  
  
"Erm, no... Hey, why are you wearing a wedding veil?" Hermes blinked a bit. "Is my name... Kathy?"  
  
Boreas stared at Hermes, "No. And you're singing in three keys at the same time."  
  
Hermes looked indignant. "I'm not singing!"  
  
"Well," amended Boreas, smiling smugly, "You're thinking in three keys."  
  
Hermes shook his head slowly, and pulled one sandal on. "Righto." The other sandal followed. "You have fun..." he lifted his hat, and flew off to Mount Olympus. Then, remembering he was supposed to be getting Persephone, he altered course for Hades.  
  
  
  
A poor landing wrenched Hermes' ankle in a way that joints just shouldn't be bent. One of Hades minions, watching from nearby, winced. "Have you considered orthotics?"  
  
Hermes stroked his imaginary beard thoughtfully.. "Hey... now there's an idea. I just might! Tell Persephone to hurry up, will you?"  
  
After a moment, Persephone walked out to join Hermes. "Spring already? Just when I was spending some quality time with my tiara." A sniff.  
  
Hermes pulled the girl by one arm. "Yes, quite tragic. Now come along, I have an errand to run after I get rid, I mean after I deliver you to your mother." He smiled to himself. Bwa ha ha. Orthotics. Take that, Zeus! 


End file.
